The fourth series in The Black Maps Project. Maisel says of his work: 'These images have as their subject matter the undoing of the natural world by the wide-scaled intervention of man's actions. Looking down on these damaged wastelands, where man's efforts have eradicated the natural order, the views through my camera are both spectacular and horrifying'
Terminal Mirage, the fourth series in internationally acclaimed artist David Maisel's The Black Maps Project, takes stock of Utah's environmentally impacted Great Salt Lake. From the air Maisel combs the scarred topography below; producing, in the end, large-scale, all encompassing color images that leave viewers awestruck. As grand as their subject matter, Maisel's prismatic photographs reveal a tilted and kaleidoscopic landscape shot through with an aching pastoral beauty.
Maisel says of his work: "These images have as their subject matter the undoing of the natural world by the wide-scaled intervention of man's actions. Looking down on these damaged wastelands, where man's efforts have eradicated the natural order, the views through my camera are both spectacular and horrifying. Although these photographs evidence the devastation before me, they also transcribe an interior psychic landscape that is profoundly disturbing. As otherworldly as the images seem, they depict a shattered reality of our own making."
Maisel's work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, the Houston Museum of Fine Art, and George Eastman House, Rochester, New York, among many others. He lives and works in the Bay Area.
A full color catalog with an essay by Anne Tucker, Curator of Photography at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, accompanies this exhibition.
Image: Terminal Mirage #262 - 3, 2003 Edition of 5, C-print, 48 x 48 or 29 x 29 inches
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